


Is this the real life?

by BrightTerror



Series: BrightTerror's 2020 Whumptober [12]
Category: Prodigal Son (TV 2019)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Dissociation, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Gil Arroyo Acting as Malcolm Bright's Parental Figure, Hallucinations, Hurt Malcolm Bright, Hurt/Comfort, Protective Gil Arroyo, Sleep Deprivation, Whump, Whumptober 2020
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-16
Updated: 2020-10-16
Packaged: 2021-03-08 23:48:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,270
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27045265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrightTerror/pseuds/BrightTerror
Summary: For Whumptober day 16: A TERRIBLE, HORRIBLE, NO GOOD, VERY BAD DAY (Hallucinations)Malcolm sees hallucinations and he has gotten used to knowing they're not real, but everyone has a breaking point and now he is doubting himself and doesnt know what is real anymore. At least he has Sunshine and Gil there for him.Takes place somewhere after episode 18 "Scheherazade" but before episode 19 "The Professionals"
Relationships: Gil Arroyo & Malcolm Bright, Malcolm Bright & Dani Powell, Malcolm Bright & JT Tarmel, Malcolm Bright & Martin Whitly
Series: BrightTerror's 2020 Whumptober [12]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1948378
Comments: 8
Kudos: 41
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Is this the real life?

**Author's Note:**

> This was one of the first prompts I wrote for this challenge and I'm very excited to post it. I hope y'all enjoy!  
> This isnt beta read so I'm sorry for any typos.

Malcolm was used to his hallucinations by now. It had become a part of his daily routine. If he was in the mood he would talk to them because why not, figure out what his brain was up to now. Gabrielle did not like that one bit but he didn’t care, he knew how to handle them well enough that he could still do his job, and that’s all that mattered to him. Other times he would just ignore them and wished they were gone; after all, more times than not, it would be his father that would show up: at work, while he was having lunch, when he was washing his teeth, when he was taking a cab…. Martin would appear and talk to him or sometimes he would just stay there without saying a word. 

For example, just today, he woke up, had breakfast and headed to work. When he was entering the precinct, he saw Martin standing there with a grin, staring as he passed.  _ It’s fake, ignore it,  _ he told himself and headed to Gil’s office to work on their new case. 

He tried to work as usual, but he hadn't gotten enough sleep, actually he didn't sleep at all for the fourth day in a row and even before that he only slept about two hours. So, his sleep-deprived hallucinations were getting  _ way  _ worse. He knew he was not doing his best at work, but he tried. Gil, the ever-worried father, knew Malcolm as his own so he knew when he was struggling. Which is why he called him into his office to ask him what was wrong. Malcolm, of course, didn’t want to admit it at first but eventually Gil got through him. 

“He is everywhere. Everywhere I go I see him… I see Martin, or Sophie, I know they aren’t real and it's just my brain messing with me… I can’t sleep at all and because of it I’m letting you down. I can’t even do my damn work.” Malcolm groaned and passed his hands through his hair. Gil couldn’t stop thinking at how childlike Malcolm’s voice became when he was hurting. 

Gil knew the kid was taking a toll with everything happening; the girl in the box, Eve leaving, Martin being Martin. But he didn’t expect Malcolm to  _ agree  _ to it. At least he knew he’s not fine, so he guessed its progress. 

“You’re not letting me down, and you will  _ never  _ let me down. It’s natural that this whole Martin and Eve situation will take a toll on you sooner or later.” Gil pinched the bridge of his nose. “I know you’re going to protest but  _ please _ take the day off, use it to rest, even if you don’t sleep just try to relax, spend time with Sunshine, I know she calms you down. Once you are feeling better you can help us crack the case. A day won’t make a big difference since we don't have solid leads yet.” He paused, then added. “And it would do you some good to avoid any news media or calls so you don’t stress and overthink everything with that brain of yours.” He smiled playfully. “What do you say?” He looked at Bright expectantly. 

Malcolm was about to tell Gil he could still work and that he was  _ fine,  _ to not worry, then thought better of it and let out a defeated sigh. “Alright, I’ll take the day off. Thanks Gil.” He grabbed his coat and slipped into the street to grab a cab, ignoring the girl in the box staring at him through one of the cop’s offices. 

_________

“ _ I’m Ainsley Whitly with the latest news. We have just been informed from the Claremont Psychiatric Hospital that the notorious serial killer, Martin Whitly, better known as the Surgeon— and who so happens to be my father— has escaped during a mandatory drill exercise. If you see him, call the police and do not engage with him. The police are informed and will do everything in their power to catch him before there are any casualties. I will be reporting back any news as the situation progresses. Stay safe, New York.” _

___

Malcolm for once, followed Gil’s instructions and avoided the news app and muted calls from his mother and Ainsley. If he had any hope of getting rest or sleep tonight, he didn’t need the usual stress that came along with most talks with his family. As he was nearing his apartment Claremont Psychiatric called him and he declined the call, grinning and feeling good with himself since he finally did not give in to his father’s calls. 

He tried to focus on the sound of the car’s engine and ignored a young brown-haired Martin Whitly who was sitting next to him in the cab.  _ Not real.  _ He repeated as a mantra. At this point his hallucinations were becoming more of an annoyance than something he was afraid of. He was  _ tired.  _ Malcolm groaned and closed his eyes. He really needed sleep and  _ soon _ . The car slowed down to drop him off in front of his apartment as Gil called him. He answered it without a second thought and with the cheeriest tone he could muster. “Hey, Gil, you will be glad to know I declined three calls from my father, and I’m going straight home to try and get some rest.” He stiffened a yawn. 

“Bright, your father, is he there?” As soon as Gil had heard of Martin’s escape, he  _ knew _ Martin would either try to contact Malcolm or he would go after Gil since the killer had some deep-rooted issues with him. However, Gil had a feeling the Surgeon would go after his son, after all, Martin needed Malcolm to  _ like  _ him more than he hated the cop. 

The problem was, Malcolm did not know anything about Martin’s escape, and he was  _ tired _ , so instead of noticing the fear in Gil’s voice and asking him about it, he thought he was asking about the hallucinations he had told him about earlier. Therefore, Bright huffed, annoyed. “Yeah, Gil. I told you already at the precinct, he keeps appearing along with the girl in the box. Please let’s not talk about it. I'm for once listening to you and going home to rest. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Bright wait-” Malcolm hung up before Gil could warn him. 

He got inside his apartment and everything was in its place; his restraints by the bed, Sunshine chirping, his meds on the counter and his usual hallucinations following him. This time it was Martin sitting on the sofa.  _ He changed places from the kitchen to the sofa. That's new.  _ He thought. Martin was also splattered in blood and his hands had a red tint from trying to clean them up. 

“Malcom, my boy, let me explain.” Martin started. He didn’t want him to call the cops immediately he knew the chances of his son giving him a chance to speak was almost null, but he wanted to try it, he didn’t want to hurt him. 

Whatever Martin was expecting from Malcolm, this wasn’t it. 

Malcolm groaned. “ _ Oh _ , you  _ are  _ talking today. I’ll take it as a sign I need to get sleep no matter what.” He rubbed his temples with his fingers to ease the headache that was getting worse and then spoke to no one in particular, probably sunshine. “Might try what Vosler did and do ECT therapy again. It might help me get rid of them and even knock me out as a bonus.” He laughed at his own words without giving Martin a second thought and went to the kitchen to grab some sparkling water.

“Malcolm?” Martin asked again, blinking a few times, confused. 

“Nope.” Malcolm shook his head as he walked past him. “Not today.” He started to walk towards his bed to try and get some sleep before the nightmares woke him but he stopped dead in his tracks a few feet away from his bed as something caught his attention on the corner of his eye. 

He turned his head and saw a bloody, dead body sprawled against the wall, a security guard, if his uniform was anything to go by. He did a double take and realised  _ he knew the guard _ , it was the guard from the building, his name was Sam. Malcolm talked to him every once in a while and shared smoothie recipes sometimes. His heartbeat accelerated and he forcefully shut his eyes before he opened them again.  _ It had to be another of his hallucinations. It had to.  _ He rubbed his eyes and tried to clear his mind. He was used to his visions and hallucinations at this point but the moment he saw that corpse he had a dreading feeling it wasn’t only in his mind. 

He dug his fingernails in his palms trying to snap out of it but when he looked back at the wall the body was still there. He started panicking and his hands were trembling. He didn’t know if he was seeing a body that was actually there or if his hallucinations had become too realistic for him to handle. Neither of those two options were good nor reassuring. 

He approached the body, his fingers trembled as he reached into the neck to check for any sign of pulse. He still had no idea if it was real or not but because of the probability that it  _ could  _ be real he could not simply ignore it. He had to make sure whether he was fully dead or if there was still a chance to save him,  _ if  _ he was real. He shuddered when he felt no pulse and he checked his wrist too; the man was dead. 

“He is dead, my boy, he recognised me when I came here, and I couldn’t have him snitching on me now could I?” Martin spoke from the couch as he started inching closer to where Malcolm was. 

“No... no, no.” Malcolm shook his head as he shut his eyes. “You aren’t real. You can’t be here... you’re locked away, you’ve been behind bars for a very long time... you are not... you’re not here.” 

That’s when Malcolm noticed something that made his blood turn cold and his heart skip a beat. While Martin was moving closer to where he was, Sunshine  _ reacted  _ to him. When Martin passed near her cage, she started flapping her wings and making more noise than usual. 

Malcolm turned his eyes— that were filled with pure terror—towards Sunshine as the realisation dawned on him. “She can see you too.” Malcolm said barely above a whisper.  _ She can’t see your hallucinations.  _ “You’re actually here.” His voice cracked. 

“Of course, I am.” Martin smiled. “Glad to see we are on the same page now, I’m not going to lie, it was kind of awkward that you didn’t pay attention to my presence until now. I thought you knew your father better.” He shrugged and ignored the fact Malcolm was having a full breakdown in front of him, he figured if he was too shaken up by his presence, he would not have time to call the police just yet. “I need your help, I need to find Nicholas Endicott, he is a danger to your mother, sister and you... and I need you to tell me where he is.” He paused to see Malcolm’s reaction—who was currently staring at him unblinking with his hands in his pockets—before he continued. “I would do my own research but,” he laughed nervously, “I’m in a pickle here and the information is time sensitive.”

Malcolm snapped out of his shock and tried to be his best profiler self, he needed to shield all his emotions from Martin. “You think I’m going to help you? After all you have done in the past two decades? You  _ just _ killed a man.” 

Martin huffed. He was getting annoyed. “Well yes, but he needs to die, and he needs to stay away from Jessica.” He paced around the apartment and made a phony laugh. “Besides, if you help me, I’ll kill him and turn myself to the police afterwards and confess to the recent murder that is currently laying on your expensive carpet….” Martin walked towards Malcolm and smiled evilly. “If you don’t… well, with me disappearing, your hallucinations and a dead body on your floor… who’s to say the police won’t think you finally snapped and broke down from reality, ending just like your father.. a  _ killer _ .” Martin sneered. He thought he could play nice at first, but he wasn’t getting anywhere, and he wanted cooperation, so he tried manipulation. 

“No, I’m not helping you. And Gil would believe me, my team... they would have my back and we would find evidence to find you and lock you away.” Malcolm yelled. 

“Really?” Martin raised an eyebrow, looking incredulous. “You don’t even know if this is real, your first thought upon seeing me was that I was a figment of your brain... your hands are covered in blood… you could be making this whole thing up and you wouldn’t even know.”

Malcolm frowned.  _ No, no, it was real. He knew it now, there was no way this was in his brain… and even if it was, he would never kill. no matter how cut from reality he was… right?  _ “No..” his voice trembled. “You’re right.” He said after a while, his voice raspy and his eyes were on the brim of tears. 

Martin perked up at his declaration. “Come again?”

“You’re right, I could be making this up and not know it, I could be experiencing a psychotic break…” he whimpered and walked closer to where Martin was. “However, Sunshine saw you. She is the one I can trust unconditionally, she grounds me to reality on my bad days. If she saw you, then you  _ are _ real.” He glared at his father. “And you’re not going anywhere.” 

Before Martin could react, Malcolm tackled him to the ground and managed to hit him with a lamp that was near. Martin did not see any of it coming since he thought he finally messed with his son’s brain enough to make him think he was delusional. Apparently, he miscalculated. Once his son tackled him, he fought back. He was careful to not hurt him as much but not too careful to let him win. 

Martin underestimated his son once again. Malcolm was trained in the FBI, and was constantly working and getting himself in danger, which meant he was more fit than Martin who spent 20 years in a cell with minimum exercise. So, after some struggling Bright managed to knock him out. 

Malcolm was left panting and gasping for breath as he stood up and tried to restrain him before he woke up. He grabbed his phone from his pocket to call Gil when he saw his phone was cracked and unusable, it must have been hit in the fight. 

He hoped Gil had gotten his message. 

_____

Malcolm took some zip ties from his kitchen and tied his father’s hands together behind his back. He made sure to make them as tight as he could so it would be more difficult to get out. He didn’t want to fight his father again and he didn’t know when Gil was coming or  _ if  _ he was coming at all. 

Once he made sure Martin would not go anywhere, he went to check on Sunshine to make sure she didn’t end up too startled with the fight. He looked at the dead body still sprawled on the wall and the carpet was now a crimson red from the blood and shuddered. 

A part of him wanted to go clean it up so the blood would disappear but the logical part of his brain reminded him his apartment was now a crime scene. He needed to conserve the place as it was so Gil and the forensics team would be able to determine what happened and take care of it. 

He looked at his hands that were all bloody from checking the guard’s pulse earlier, his sleeves were also coated with blood from the fight with his father. They had fought near the body so he must have gotten stained with the blood that was on the floor. His hands were trembling, and he had no idea how long they had been trembling. What made it worse was the adrenaline was starting to fade and Malcolm was becoming more and more painfully aware of everything that had happened. He put his head onto his hands and then tugged his hair in desperation. 

He took a rag from the kitchen and started to scrub his hands trying to get rid of the blood. He hated how it was drying up and started to feel crustier, the blood under his fingernails wouldn’t go away and all he was doing at this point was making his hand turn an itchy shade of red. 

Of course, that didn’t stop Malcolm from continuing to scrub through his hands and arms trying to get rid of everything. He heard Sunshine chirping and so he looked at her, he saw she was fine, but her cage was dripping red liquid he was too familiar with. He shook his head trying to clear it, now was not the time to try and figure out what was reality and what wasn’t. 

He looked down at his hands once more and he was sure there had been way less bloody before. He didn’t remember having his sleeves completely bloodied to the point he couldn’t see the original colour of the shirt. His breathing was uneven at this point, he went to grab another rag from the kitchen to clean up when he noticed he wasn’t standing in the kitchen anymore,  _ when did he leave the kitchen in the first place? What is he doing in the couch?  _ He thought he heard something coming from Martin and he snapped his head to look at him, he became more jittery by the second, and he felt he couldn’t breathe when he saw Martin was still unconscious but he was now a big red, oozy gash on his half smashed head that made his usual white shirt turn a more crimson colour. 

_ Oh god had he done that?  _ Malcolm’s eyes were wide, and he was trembling. He couldn’t have done that, it was in his head,  _ right?  _ He looked at Sunshine again, hoping somehow, she could tell him what was going on, but she seemed normal, oblivious to the chaos that had happened, if it ever happened in the first place. He wasn’t sure of it anymore. He wasn’t sure of anything anymore. 

He let himself fall to the floor and sat there, not moving an inch.

_______

Gil huffed the moment Bright hung up. He couldn’t warn him which meant there was now a very tired and therefore a very unstable Bright unaware of the dangers he could be in if Martin found him first. 

He didn’t want to risk it, so he grabbed his keys and headed to Bright’s apartment. He was stuck in traffic and tried to call him again, but the signal wasn’t good where he was. A few minutes later, he was still stuck in traffic but noticed his phone had a new call. It was Bright. He answered immediately. “Bright?” 

_ “You think I’m going to help you? After all you have done in the past two decades? You just killed a man.” _ Bright said through the phone, it did not take much for Gil to figure out the kid was not speaking to him, the voice was muffled and if he had to guess he would say Malcolm still had the phone in his pocket. 

_ “Well yes, but he needs to die, and he needs to stay away from Jessica.” _ Gil heard Martin through the phone and his blood ran cold,  _ that son of a bitch was there with Malcolm.  _ He silently cursed and put his phone on speaker, then sending a message to Dani ‘ _ 911, Malcolm’s apartment, bring backup.’  _ He hoped Dani would see it soon, but he could not hang up the call to call her or he would miss listening to Bright in case he needed anything. He drove faster as he heard Martin continue his monologue.

_ “Besides, if you help me, I’ll kill him and turn myself to the police afterwards and confess to the recent murder that is currently laying on your expensive carpet…. If you don’t… well, with me disappearing, your hallucinations and a dead body on your floor… who’s to say the police won't think you finally snapped and broke down from reality, ending just like your father.. a killer.” _

_ “No, I’m not helping you. And Gil would believe me, my team... they would have my back and we would find evidence to find you and lock you away.” Malcolm yelled.  _ Gil felt pride knowing Malcolm trusted him to have his back. 

_ “Really? You don’t even know if this is real, your first thought upon seeing me was that I was a figment of your brain. your hands are covered in blood from the body… you could be making this whole thing up and you wouldn’t even know.”  _

Gil swore at the traffic and ignored any driving rules he ever learned in favour of getting to his kid sooner. He needed help and Gil knew Martin’s manipulation was something Bright could never escape from. He hated the surgeon with his entire soul. He grabbed onto the wheel tighter from his built-up rage and continued listening. 

_ “You're right,” Malcolm said,  _ and Gil’s heart broke a little hearing that. The hurt in his kid’s voice made him want to kill the bastard of his father. _ “Come again?” Martin said _

_ “You’re right, I could be making this up and not know it, I could be experiencing a psychotic break…However… sunshine saw you, she is the one I can trust unconditionally; she grounds me to reality on my bad days. If she saw you, then you are real. And you’re not going anywhere.”  _

Gil almost crashed his car when he heard something smashed at the other end of the call and fell and then the line went dead. Gil cursed and called Dani. “Powell, backup better be on their way, Malcolm is in danger. I am 4 minutes away.”

“Backup already on its way, JT and I are also on the way, we should get there in around 7 minutes”

“Hurry” Gil said before hanging up and focusing on not crashing so he could get to Malcolm’s apartment. 

He made it in under 3 minutes, he jumped off his car, grabbed his gun, and took out Malcolm's second set of keys he had given him for emergencies. Even though he knew he was going to find a dead body from the conversation he overheard on the phone call, nothing prepared him for when he opened up the door and found what he did. 

The first thing he saw was the signs of a struggle all over the apartment and a very unconscious but otherwise well, Martin Whitly. Gil was going to handcuff him when he saw Martin already had his hands tied with Zip ties, so he would worry about it later. He looked around the apartment and noticed there was some legs sticking out from near a wall and he ran to see if it was Malcolm. He quickly saw it was not him, but the dead guard Malcolm had mentioned, he ignored the dead body for now in favour of finding Malcolm and making sure he was okay. 

He walked around the apartment and a few moments later he spotted Malcolm, he was sitting on the floor near the couch—which is why he hadn’t spotted him when he first came in but until now. 

Gil’s heart finished shattering in a million pieces when he saw the state of the other man. Malcolm’s entire body was trembling, his shirt was splattered with blood, especially his sleeves but not enough blood to cause alarm. Gil hoped it was somebody else’s blood and not his. There was a bloody rag clutched in Malcolm’s hand that was repeatedly scratching the other as he tried to clean off the blood. 

“Malcolm?” Gil softly called out as he approached him, he didn’t want to scare him, the kid had clearly been through enough. 

Malcolm showed no indication of hearing him; he was completely unresponsive and was staring at the wall with hazy, unfocused eyes and kept scrubbing his hands. 

Gil gently tapped on his shoulder and called for him again. “Bright? Can you hear me?” 

Malcolm blinked once but didn’t move an inch and continued staring at the wall. “I killed him…” he croaked. 

“The guard?” Gil frowned. 

“I killed him, my father...” 

“Martin? Kid you didn’t kill him, you just knocked him unconscious.” 

“No, no, no,” he panicked. “I thought I did but he was all bloodied… I think I bashed his head.” His voice was trembling, and he started to shake even more. “And then sunshine- she- there’s blood in her cage and I did it.” He cried. “Gil will hate me… I am my father’s son.”

Gil knew there was no blood on Sunshine’s cage and he certainly knew Martin did not have a smashed head. “Kid, it’s Gil, I’m here.” He grabbed his hand carefully. “Sunshine is okay, and you didn’t kill Martin, you are  _ not _ your father.” 

Malcolm blinked once and shakily looked at him with his bright doe eyes. Gil thought he kind of looked like Bambi. “Gil? Is that really you?”

Gil felt tears threatening to spill in his eyes, but he blinked them away. “I’m here kid,” he engulfed him in a hug. “I’m real. You’re going to be okay. Backup is on its way.”

Malcolm hugged Gil back and clutched onto him like that was his only lifeline to reality. He hid his head in the crook of his neck as he did back when he was a kid and took in the familiar smell that screamed safety. Gil was what grounded him on the bad days like today, he and Sunshine were the two people he trusted and one wasn’t even a human being. 

He peeked towards where Martin was while still being surrounded by Gil’s hug and saw his father was laying down half unconscious and very much alive. He let out a breath of relief that Martin didn’t, in fact, have a bashed head as he previously thought and that Sunshine was okay. Then he remembered the guard that the surgeon killed. “I didn’t kill the guard; I came home, and he was already gone.” he leaned back from the hug and remembered his sleeves were still covered in blood. “I know I have his blood all over me, but I was trying to see if I could save him. When Martin attacked me, I fell to the ground and got the rest of my blood on it.” He started to ramble and take shorter breaths. 

“Kid, breathe in, breathe out... I know you didn’t kill him. I heard your phone call; you don’t have to explain anything right now.” Gil told him. 

Before he could respond Dani, JT and two other cops entered with their guns. “NYPD-” Dani yelled and stopped when she saw Gil kneeling on the ground next to Malcolm who was sitting down. “You both okay?” She asked and raised an eyebrow at Malcolm being covered in blood. 

“Yeah, he is just a bit shook up, but he will be okay.” Gil responded for both of them. “Martin is over there, he is waking up so it would be good to put some handcuffs on him before he tries to get the zip ties off, also there’s a dead body there, we need to call Edrisa and her team” 

Dani nodded and told the two other cops to call forensics while her and JT dealt with Martin, who by the time the handcuffs were on, he had completely woken up and was currently complaining of his headache. 

Dani and JT were walking Martin out of the apartment to put him inside the police car but when they were leaving Martin stopped in his tracks to speak at Malcolm. 

“Well look at that, you have put me away twice now.” Martin laughed with distaste and glared at his son “You should have helped me, my boy. You and I, we are the same, we could have dealt with it all and now your sister and mother are in danger, all because of  _ you _ .” 

He didn’t have the chance to say anything else before JT manhandled him out of the apartment by force while death glaring at him and Dani went with him. The two other officers were already waiting for forensics and labelling evidence. 

Gil helped Malcolm stand up and grabbed a bag that was not covered in blood. “Kid, your apartment is a crime scene, you can’t stay here. You’re staying with me tonight.” He tossed the bag to Malcolm. “Grab some clean clothes and you can finish cleaning up at my place. we will deal with everything else tomorrow.”

Malcolm nodded mutely and automatically did as he was told, he tried to ignore the mess that was his apartment and grabbed a new change of clothes and a brand-new suit for tomorrow. He grabbed Sunshine’s cage and looked at Gil with his puppy eyes. “Can she also stay with us? I don’t want to leave her here.”

Gil looked at his kid’s puppy eyes and sighed, there was no way he would say no to him. “Sure. But if she makes a mess you are cleaning it up.”

“She is well behaved, I promise.” He gave a small smile and headed to Gil’s car. 

Gil felt a little more relaxed at seeing his kid smile again, he knew then he would be okay. He talked to the other officers, Jake and Peter, to make sure everything was taken care of and called it a night. All he was going to worry about for the next 24 hours was whether Bright was sleeping enough and that he didn’t get into any more trouble. 

When he got into the car, Malcolm was already there with sunshine in the back, waiting for him. “Are there any liquorice twizzlers at your place?”

“Of course, there are, there’s always twizzlers since it’s the only thing your skinny self will eat.” Gil started the car and they drove in silence for a while. “What was Martin talking about earlier, about wanting to kill someone?” 

“He wanted me to help him kill Nicholas Endicott.” 

“The one who was in charge of the Ballet Company fundraiser? In that one case we had a few weeks back?” Gil asked and Malcolm nodded. “I don’t trust that guy. He was too  _ snobby _ .” 

“Yeah,” Malcolm snorted. “something irks me about him, though and my father sounded like he had an underlying reason to kill him not just because he is a killer... I'll tell Ains to look for dirt on him and we can run a background check on him tomorrow, just to make sure.” Malcolm stiffened a yawn. “But first I’m gonna sleep like the damn dead and get some liquorice twizzlers.” 

Gil laughed and took one hand off the wheel to ruffle Bright’s hair. “Alright, Let’s get you those liquorice candy and a bed to sleep.”

**Author's Note:**

> You made it this far! thanks for reading! I would love to hear your thought in the comments about what you thought of it! 
> 
> I am writing Prodigal Son and Criminal Minds the most for this whumptober challenge so if you like those fandoms you can subscribe to my BrightTerror's 2020 whumptober series!  
> If you want to come and chat find me on Tumblr as: @BrightTerror (My writing blog) or @Sherlock-Freud (My prodigal son blog)  
> Have an amazing day!


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